Mooching around in Malmsbury...

And now for something completely different: some old looking photos that aren't really old at all but are the product of a misguided afternoon spent messing about with software in pursuit of creativity.

Malmsbury Viaduct over Coliban River circa 2018

I'm playing with a few things lately: my camera remote which had been acting up and which Him On The Couch fixed because he is really quite clever; some camera filters that I purchased a filter bag for, making them easy to access but not scratch); the Nik Collection software and its fancy pants Analog Efex Pro editing presets; and this website and its new ability to resize singular pictures like that one up there, and this one down here: 

Malmsbury Viaduct over Coliban River (which at this point is a foot wide trickle of water that you can't even see in this photo).

I'm undecided about the bigger single pictures. They look okay on their own, but I'm not sure I like them when they're combined with the smaller slideshows (that's the bunch of pictures that automatically display on this site, for those of you who are technologically unminded. That's an IT term; keep up.)

The single pictures now have resizing handles, which I'd never noticed before, which means either they really are new or I've just been blissfully unaware of their existence. Have a look at the larger size pictures next to the slideshow towards the end of this post (of course there's one) and if you feel inclined, let me know what you reckon. Feel free to put forth your opinion, so I can promptly laugh at it and then go about my business!

How it really looks. More or less...

I had a bit of a roam around the tiny township of Malmsbury, which is about 100km north of Melbourne. It was a pleasant enough day, with minimal traffic and people. There's a really nice botanical garden and lake which is a good vantage point for photographing the Malmsbury Viaduct which crosses the Coliban River on the Bendigo train line. It was built in the mid 1800's, stands 25 metres high and is 100 metres long,

Although I spent over an hour at the gardens, I didn't see another soul. Ditto for the railway station and the old stone hotel known now as The Mansions, which is an all-but-abandoned bit of a mess. The railway station was opened in 1862 and is still in use, although the crappy tin shelters on the southern platform look like a decent wind would deposit them elsewhere without too much trouble. It's a shame the old bluestone buildings on the northern platform were put to pasture 30-odd years ago. 

Taradale viaduct over Back Creek valley

I've had the Nik editing software for a while now, and have played with it a bit but it's not really useful for commercial work. It's fun for making images look bit different and I thought the viaducts at Malmsbury and Taradale would be good subjects for some old-style effects.

Taradale is about 5 minutes drive from Malmsbury, and has its own viaduct over a valley, but it looks completely different to the Malmsbury one.  It's on the same train line but it's a wrought iron box girder bridge whereas Malmsbury's effort is an arch bridge made primarily of bluestone. It's twice as long as Malmsbury and about 10 metres taller. Both bridges were constructed around the same time.

Proof of use!